Culture Apothecary with Alex Clark - Selling Sickness: SSRIs & The Side Effects Buried By Pharma | Kim Witczak

Episode Date: February 4, 2025

On August 6, 2003, Kim Witczak’s life was shattered when her husband, Woody, died unexpectedly at just 37 years old, shortly after being prescribed Zoloft. In this conversation, Kim takes us through her relentless journey to uncover the unknown risks and side effects of SSRIs and her mission to hold Big Pharma accountable.As a Consumer Representative on the FDA Psychopharmacologic Advisory Committee, Kim has spent years pushing for greater transparency, educating healthcare providers, and advocating for better regulations. Her personal story and expert insights serve as a wake-up call for anyone using or considering antidepressants—and as a call to action for reform in the way prescription drugs are regulated and marketed.If you or someone you know is struggling, please reach out for help 💜📞 U.S. Suicide Prevention Hotlines:988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline – Call or text 988 (Available 24/7)Crisis Text Line – Text HELLO to 741741 (Free, 24/7 support)Veterans Crisis Line – Dial 988, then press 1🔗 https://988lifeline.org – Official website for the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, offering confidential support, resources, and chat options.Thank you to our sponsors! 😊Taylor Dukes Wellness | Use code "ALEXCLARK" for 10% OFF⁠Zebra⁠ | Use code "ALEX for 10% OFFJoovv | Get an exclusive discount on your first red light therapy order!Cozy Earth | Use code "ALEX" for 40% OFFA’del Natural Cosmetics | Use code "ALEX" for 25% OFFOur Guest:⭐️ Kim WitczakInstagram | @kim_witczakX | ⁠@woodymattersWebsite #1 | https://www.woodymatters.comWebsite #2 |  kimwitczak.com1991 FDA hearing🎀Follow Alex🎀Instagram | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@realalexclark⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@cultureapothecary⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@realalexclark⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠X | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@yoalexrapz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@RealAlexClark⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Culture Apothecary with Alex Clark ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple Podcast | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Culture Apothecary with Alex Clark⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠New 'Culture Apothecary' Merch OUT NOW! Glass tumblers, weekly wellness planners, hats, crewnecks and more. Use code "Alex Clark" for 10% OFF at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠tpusamerch.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Join the Cuteservatives Facebook group to connect with likeminded friends who love America and all things health and wellness! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Join the CUTEservative Facebook Group!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Subscribe to ‘Culture Apothecary’ on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. New episodes drop 6pm PST/ 9pm EST every Monday and Thursday.This show is made possible with generous donations from listeners who believe in our mission to heal a sick culture.You can support our show by leaving a tax deductible donation ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠HERE⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ or by subscribing to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@RealAlexClark⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ YouTube for FREE! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠#cultureapothecary #alexclark #podcast  #health  #wellness

Your husband was found dead five weeks after starting an antidepressant. I don't even know that Woody knew it was an antidepressant. Everything intuitively in my body said there's no way Woody killed himself. You want to keep cradle to grave customers telling you that you have a chemical imbalance and you're going to have to be on it for life. And then you tell them that you can't get off of them. On August 6th of 2003, Kim Wittzac's world came crashing down. While out of town, she got a call from her dad telling her,

Woody, her husband of almost 10 years, was found hanging from the rafters of their garage, dead at the age of 37. The most recent change in her husband's life, a prescription to Zoloft. This episode is about the unknown risks and side effects of SSRIs or antidepressants that every person needs to be aware of. Kim was hungry for justice. This journey for the truth took her to the FDA, HHS, Congress, the courts, and the media fighting for more drug transparency and accountability. To advocate and educate doctors, health care providers, legislators, and government agencies as a counterbalance to the stories that are being peddled by the big pharma lobby. She's currently a consumer representative on the FDA Psycho-Farmacologic Advisory Committee

and travels the globe sharing her story and expertise. Watch this episode on the real Alex Clark YouTube channel, although, just a reminder, Anytime we say a certain word due to YouTube guidelines, we're going to have to beep it. Or you could watch it on Culture Apothecary there on Spotify. Please pause and leave a free five-star review for us right now. Or if you are financially able and find it in your heart to give, we are completely donor-funded. So you can leave a tax-deductible donation through the link in the show notes, specifically to fund the costs of making this show.

Please welcome the legendary and very brave, Kim Witzack, to Culture Apothecary. What is the first word that comes to mind when you hear Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil, Lexapro, and Selexa? Corruption. Lies. Misled. The marketing that has, which is more than one word, but the marketing has been behind the success of these drugs. Before your husband's passing, did you ever have an idea that Zoloft or the medication he was on might be influencing his mental state in such a profound way? No, truthfully, I had never really knew much about

antidepressants at all. You know, it's interesting years before that, I had started a nonprofit working with abused and neglected kids. And I remember using the power of arts. And I will never forget, in this was in early mid-90s, every one of those kids picked up of a cup of meds. And I remember thinking, like, are they all sick, like strep throat? And she said, no, this is their behavior medicine. staff people. So that was like how blind I was to any of these mental health drugs prior to my husband's death. What year did you get married? I got married in 1993. What do you remember about falling in love with your husband initially? He's super funny. I remember when I first met him at a bar was my birthday party and I went into the use the bathroom and here he's standing and he

started talking to me because he overheard me talking to some other guys about Minnesota. And I said, are you from Minnesota? He goes, no, those guys were losers. And I remember like talking and laughing with him. And he said he would call me the next day. And he did. And that was the start of our relationship that eventually turned to marriage. What did the doctor prescribe him? And what did the doctor tell him about the risk of that medication? He got samples of Zoloft. He went in there because he had just started his dream job with a startup company and was having trouble sleeping. He went to see his doctor who he always went to see his doctor for like they usually like fixed it like a stitches or something like that so he got samples of zoloft for insomnia and how long did he use

those samples before getting like the full blown prescription it was a three week sample pack and then he was alive two more weeks after that that was it five weeks five weeks from the start of his first prescription or the pill to the time he was found dead. And to your knowledge, how much time was spent in that doctor visit going over risks and side effects of Zoloft? Oh, I'm going to say probably little to nothing. You know, I think Woody was assuming that like a lot of us do, that the pill that he was getting would help him sleep. And that was what he was told, that this pill will help take the edge off and help you sleep. And so Woody, I don't even know that Woody knew it was an antidepressant. Was he on any other medications at the time? No, he was on no other medications. Take us back to that day

in 2003. What do you remember? So it was August. I was out on a shoot. It was my busy time of the year. And I hadn't heard from Woody all day. And which was kind of bizarre because we talked all the time. And so I finally called my dad, like, towards the end of the day. And I'm like, hey, dad, do me a favor. I haven't heard from Woody at all today. And I'm afraid, like, Woody hit his head or something. And so that's what I was expecting. And so my dad's like, sure, my parents lived a couple miles away. And they went over. And I'm in the middle of a shoot. It's like nine o'clock at night. And my dad calls and he's like, it's bad. It's bad. I'm like, what do you mean? It's bad. And he's like, Woody's dead. I'm like, what? What do you mean? Woody's dead? I'm like, what do you mean?

dead. And I'm like, how do you know he's dead? Like, how do you know he's dead? And he's like, he's hanging. I'm like, what? What? And so, like, literally in that moment, I remember I was in the back lot. I come back into the studio. And like, I don't even know that I knew anything. Like, it just went black. Everything went black because it was so shocking. And even when I tell that story, because I kind of forget about the night of getting that call. But I will never forget trying to get back to the hotel because I'm out of town. So now I have to figure out how am I going to get back to Minneapolis? And I'm like, the whole time I was like, would he killed himself? Like what? Like how this isn't even possible? Like what do you mean would he killed himself? In any prior history of any type of depressive episodes

or distress or suicidal ideation or anything? No, Woody got it. Like so that was the whole point. Like Woody wasn't depressed. Like I had been married to him for 10. years and dated him for three years prior. So Woody got, when he got put on that drug, it was his startup job, startup company, electrical engineering. It was like a dream job for him. And so he was having trouble sleeping. So I knew that, right? He went, but when he went into the doctor, I happened to be just left to go out of the country for the first three weeks that Woody got put on that drug. So I wasn't even around when Woody went to the doctor. I left. I left Sunday, he went to the doctor Monday. I come home three weeks later because I was in New Zealand.

I come home and I will never forget something that now I look back and it should have been like something I should have recognized but I didn't know to even look for anything. I come home. I was waiting for Woody. He walks through our back door, completely drenched through his dress shirt. His hands, he falls to the floor. I don't want to like and grabs in a fetal position. Kim, you got to help me. I don't know what's happening. me my head's out of my body you got help me and he's rocking back and forth like this and I'm like oh and I remember just looking at him going oh my god witty if your job is so stressful quit like I had no but he had been on medication at that point yeah he had been on it for three weeks I mean that almost

sounds like hallucinations and yeah he said he was driving around all day and he couldn't like stop crying and so we calmed him down we did breathing we prayed um he eventually called his doctor and And the doctor said, you got to give it four to six weeks to kick in. Oh, my gosh. So we had no idea. So when Woody died, like literally, it made absolutely, absolutely, absolutely no sense. Because this isn't a guy who had a history of depression or he wasn't depressed. In fact, he was because he was super anal about making sure he kept track of how many miles he ran on his running shoes because he was trying to train for a marathon.

We had his binder. running until the day he died. And was there any notes left or any explanation? No note. Was that the hardest part? Yeah, I'm not going to lie. Until the day I moved out of my house five years later, I still was like, Woody, come on. Like, I know you had to left me a note because we left notes all the time because we both

traveled for work. He was in sales and was gone. And I always called him the honey-do list, you know, like, hi, honey. You know, they'd be leaving in my car or whatever. But I'm like, wait, you went on the biggest trip of your life and you did not leave me a note the night that Woody was found. I was sitting in my hotel room trying to figure out how I was getting home. And the coroner got on the phone and asked me a simple question. Was Woody taking any medication?

And I didn't even know what it was. I go, yeah, I think it's upstairs. And she goes, oh, no, there's a bottle of Zolov sitting on the kitchen counter. under a light. And I said, and she goes, Zoloft, and I go, yeah, that's it. And she goes, we're going to take it with us. It might have something to do with his death. And so that was the first time you'd ever kind of had that in your mind.

Yeah, I didn't even ever put two and two together. And especially when we called the doctor and the doctor's like, you know, you got to give the drug four to six weeks. Like I didn't put anything together. So that was clue number one. And clue number two, the front page of our newspaper. had an article that said the UK finds link between antidepressants and suicide in teens. And so in some ways, I believe that those were the notes.

And the pills under the light? The light. I mean, you can't even make this up. Like, there's been so many God moments in this, what I call the battle for Woody, that I believe there was a higher purpose behind it. And it almost like, it still gets me pretty emotional. I believe it had to be somebody like Woody who had no history that went from this to hanging. He went from not sleeping to head outside the body in three weeks to hanging in a total of five weeks.

And at that time, you have to remember, there were no warnings. There were nothing. Like now, today it's very different. But that became what I call the Battle for Woody, the mission, is if we are smart, like we were smart. We knew none of this. none of this. But that night when Woody was found, my dad called, you know, my mom and my sister and her husband, Eric. And Eric went home and Googled Zoloft and suicide. Had no idea that in 1991, the FDA held hearings when it was just Prozac on the market and the advisory board

meeting where they looked at the emergence of violence and suicide. And every one of those members on that advisory board committee took money from pharmaceutical companies that made antidepressant products. And they all went like this. Nope, we don't see anything. That was 91. And I would encourage every one of your viewers, if you don't believe me, there are videos out on YouTube and I have them on even on my YouTube channel that are 1991 family members that were telling their loved one's stories from like killing their kids and then themselves somebody who took a gun to their head and they had just started Prozac. And so for these, the FDA and these advisory board members who did nothing in 91, nothing. They told Eli Lilly to study suicidality. They never did and the FDA never followed

up. Meanwhile, now we have Zoloft and Paxil and it gets approved for kids and now it's 2003 and Woody's dead. After Woody's death, how long did it take you before you were like, I'm making the first step, like I'm basically going into activism now or I'm sounding alarms like, who did you

go to first or what did you do? Well, I mean, I'm going to say this. You don't just come out and go, you know, I'm going to take on this fight. Well, of course, yeah. But you must have done something like I'm going to go talk to his doctor. I'm going to, you know, I remember after Wood died and we had our funeral and the agency that I worked at made these life-sized posters of Woody and they were all in my basement and I was sitting down there like looking at these life-sized

posters of Woody and I'm bawling and for anybody like heartache's real and it's like I'm trying to scratch out with this pain and I kept praying God take my pain and use it it does me no good I just wanted this to go away right and meanwhile my brother law, my sister's husband is praying because he at this point has ordered all of these books. Probably one of the first one was by David Healy, led him to meet Prozac, and then another one by Peter Brigham. And he literally did not sleep for a week straight. And he read all this. And so while I was saying, use my pain, take my pain and use it, he was praying, I need to do something with all of this information. So he came to me and he said, I think I figured

out what happened to Woody. And this was probably not even two, three weeks, four weeks after Woody died. Because everything intuitively in my body said there's no way Woody killed himself. We had just planned our 10-year anniversary trip to go to Thailand. We couldn't do kids without having like in vitro. And so we just booked that. We booked our, his mom and dad's trip to Hawaii with him. I'm like, there is no way Woody would kill himself. Literally, I kind of feel like it was that kind of coming together. And then I will say, when I met Woody, we used to live in Chicago. And he said, when I died, don't put me, don't throw me in the box. And he goes, I want my ashes in the middle of Lake Michigan, right? Which is, you know, he always called Chicago home. And so I literally, we had one funeral in Minneapolis, another one in Chicago.

And we were going to get ready to spread his ashes in the middle of the lake. And it's my brother-in-law, again, my sister's husband and me, standing at the other edge of the boat. I'm holding this box of Woody. And I'm like, I cannot believe this is what we become is like, this isn't Woody. Like, and Alson, we look down in the middle of the lake. What is that? And it's this red book floating. And I go, does that say what I think it does? And he goes, yeah, in gold letters, it said the Holy Bible. What? It's crazy. This is what I'm, and that floated right by us. Whoa. And the two of, thank God it wasn't just me who saw it. They'd be like, oh my God, He's a crazy grieving widow making this off, right? Yeah.

But we both. Yeah. Both of us. And that became my partner. And it was almost like God's saying, trust me, you guys. Like, Woody's here. Like, but this is a mission that I'm going to be with you. And so really after that happened, he and I, like, started going out to D.C.

Because we're like, this has to be what we're going to do. We're going to get warnings. Like, if these guys in 91 didn't do their job, we have to do it. Like, we had binders. not binders from what eventually I always talk about my binders, but we put binders of information that we found on Google and just found all this stuff and other stories, like a little 13-year-old kid that there was a big story about

that hung himself, they had just moved. And so we knew that there were some things happening because of what happened in what we were reading over in the UK. So that became our mission. And I was lucky because I had a company that they saw this passion because they also knew Woody and they're like no way would Woody have done that. They gave me, which I have to say for anybody who has an ability to help somebody who's had grief, this company gave me short-term disability for five months and I still

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So Eric and I contacted them, told them the story about head outside the body that Woody was saying that he had. And the guys in L.A., the lawyers said, hey, can you come out to L.A.? And we went out, we flew out again on our time and met with them. And immediately they said, we want this lawsuit. We're going to take it. And that's one of the other aspects of my battle for Woody. We had, you know, talking to the FDA, met with the top FDA officials. We had a lawsuit.

We met with members of Congress. We also I met with the media because I'm not afraid of the media. I'm like, you guys need to be telling this story too. And so it's interesting. I contrast the media today versus what the media was back then. It actually did do their job or at least would help report on maybe it was mostly promoting how great these drugs were. Because remember, this was also the era of time. magazine had just named Prozac the Happy Pill.

Right. And it was all over. So you have to look at the time frame of when this was as well. And so what happened with the lawsuit? That was an interesting experience. Eventually it became resolved. Like a settlement, you mean? Yep.

Okay. There were all kinds of lawsuits. I had no idea that there were all these suicide lawsuits happening at the time that Woody was even put on this drug. For antidepressants specifically? Yeah. Antidepressants and suicide. There were all sorts of lawsuits.

And who makes... Zoloft. Zoloft is Pfizer. So I had a lawsuit with Zach v. Pfizer. It was just our case. But little do people know. The FDA was intervening in all of these private lawsuits. And people don't realize that the guy who went inside FDA, his name was Dan Troy, he got $300,000 from Pfizer before he took that job. Every time. It's amazing. And so this guy, Dan Troy, he was speaking at a legal counsel for in-house drug companies as well as outside counsel representing drug companies where it was, he was one of the main speakers and basically said, make it a Hollywood pitch, and quote unquote, his words, make it a Hollywood pitch. And I'll determine if the FDA will intervene in your private

lawsuits. Basically, it's this brief called preemption, which says, even if Pfizer wanted to warn, the FDA is the ultimate, you know, control of the label, which is not true. And it supersedes, I mean, it's all like legal jargon, but it supersedes like state laws. Not true. But what happened is most of the cases were getting thrown out because of what the FDA was doing. And so we help to expose this working with one of the representatives, Representative Hinchie out in New York, where we exposed that he got $300,000 from Pfizer. Eventually, Dan Troy left and went back and became the Global Chief Counsel for Glaxo Smith-Kline, the makers of Paxil. Would you agree that this is exclusively an American problem? It is an American problem. This revolving door between going from

industry regulatory agencies back to industry it's about money it is about money it was not none of this was about woody how many people die due to side effects from antidepressants i don't have the exact number of that but i can say a properly prescribed pharmaceuticals it's the second or third leading cause of death so what you're saying is people that take their prescription drugs as they are told, it is the third or fourth leading cause of death in the United States. That's, I mean, that's approximately, what, 130,000 people a year? 130, exactly. It's about 130,000 people every single year. There are experts who actually say it's higher than that. I remember, and this will be an example, we went to the FDA, met with the head FDA officials that approved this class of

drugs, right, that were responsible for the antidepressants. We went with Dr. Healy, who was, again, let him eat Prozac, myself, a couple other families who had lost loved ones the same way as Woody, things like breakups, got nervous from, like I'm graduated from college, I don't have a job yet. I mean, normal things, right? That's how they got put on the drug and then went on and killed themselves. They were mostly hangings. But we went and met with the FDA officials and they said, this is just an anecdote. And I'm like, what? He goes, well, we didn't see these in the double-blinded placebo-controlled studies. And I'm like, what? Like, I thought for sure, and this is how naive I was back then, like, I thought for sure they would be like, well, this is really interesting. This guy

got this drug awfully, like, not even for depression, and he hung himself in five weeks. Like, or this kid got it because they moved to a new neighborhood, and he hung himself. Like, I would think they would have been interested. But instead they said, this is just an anecdote when there's a plane crash. You know, they send in a separate agency that would go in and investigate and see, like, where's the black box where, you know, like what happened, you know, to hear the recording on a plane? They had no interest. And so that was like one of those things. I'm like, they don't care about the harms. And so now today, is there a black box warning on Zoloft? Yes. Eventually, in 2004, we were able to help get black box warnings for kids under. And so, and so they were,

18. Well, of course, the documents, the internal company documents, these companies have known it's all ages at risk. So we really pushed to get all ages. And eventually the FDA raised it to age 24 in 2006. And to this day, 2025, there still is no warning for all ages. Yet some of the documents that came out from my lawsuit that are from discovery phase in lawsuits that show, you know, what the company's new. Pfizer knew that it happens on all ages. To this day, there's no warning for all ages. And every single time, we keep seeing that they're like, oh, we got to take the black box warning off. They've tried it back in like 2010. They had the mental health groups say, oh, the reasons why we're having rise of suicides is because of the black box warning. And then they try to

it again like probably five years later and now they're back at it again we're hearing that they're trying to get black box warnings removed again. Is there ever a case where antidepressants work? Most of the efficacy studies or the studies to get the drug approved, it was barely better than placebo the most of the other ones because you only needed to get two studies that showed that the drug had efficacy and against the safety. And, you know, of course, that was one of the things I learned that the pharmaceutical companies control the studies to get the drugs approved on the market. I'm like, wait, you're letting them control it. They get to control the narrative. They get to control the protocols. Like, that makes no sense from a regulatory agency that you think

is supposed to be doing the job of public health and determining. But so when I look back at the efficacy of the antidepressant products, it was barely better than placebo. And then to see how marketing took it and called it a chemical imbalance. And so there's this whole lie of the chemical imbalance. It's a marketing ploy? Yeah, it's marketing. That's not science.

We know that it maybe could do something to a brain. But there is no test. Like, if you go into your doctor, how do they mostly tell you that you may be depressed? You fill out a questionnaire. Well, if you look at that questionnaire that they use, that was created. Nobody looks at the tiny type at the very bottom. It's called the PHQ9 screening form. And it's systematically used across the U.S.

and I think even across the world. And it was created by a generous donation. if you look at the very bottom, a generous donation by Pfizer Inc. And three key opinion leaders. It leads people into basically saying, yes, I'm depressed. It's a screening tool. It is like we use it in marketing. We call it a funnel.

It's like honey to flies. Yes. Get a bunch of people here because once they're in the funnel, they're ours. And that's what I look at this screening form. It was created by a Pfizer marketing guy in the 90s. And so it's the questionnaire that I bet your audience know. in the last two weeks have you felt sad? Have you felt lessenworthy? Have you felt like, yes? Yes. I mean, every time I put it. Hello. Yeah. And it's, in my doctor's offices and it's used at pediatricians,

it's used at GPs, at the, you know, general practitioners. They give it to you at the time, like, is this your insurance form? And you do not have to fill it out. Like I personally, it says in my record, I will not fill it out. My doctor didn't even know, didn't see the bottom. type where it said, a generous donation by Pfizer Inc. And three doctors. I go, do you know anything about those doctors? She goes, no. I go, let me tell you.

They're all key opinion leaders who get monies from pharmaceutical companies to go out and promote the agendas of the companies. It reminds me of Purdue creating that chart of the pain whenever they were promoting OxyGOTN too, because that was in every single doctor's office. You know, on the scale, where's your pain at? Pick this little smiley face. Yeah. It's the same thing.

My background, like I said, is in marketing. And I originally, like, so now I call myself the accidental advocate, because I do more than just, you know, mental health. It's like the pharmaceutical industry. I thought it was just an isolated issue with antidepressants. It's not. It's our whole drug. It's our system that is broken. Your husband was found dead five weeks after starting an antidepressant.

most people are on antidepressants for decades. So what are we seeing now happen to those people? We're finding that people are having difficulties getting off. They are having issues with sexual dysfunction. Those warnings are in other countries, not at the FDA. We're still not recognizing it. That is a huge problem. When I look at the documents that we got out from under seal in the lawsuit,

there was at the FDA actually asked Pfizer to prepare a list on withdrawal and Pfizer said we'll have one prepared in case they insist there was another document from from Paxil why they didn't want people to know because it was a billion dollar industry so they intentionally did not tell people or our doctors that people were going to have a hard time getting off of these drugs there was a guy who was the CEO of Merck in 1976 Fortune Mexican magazine article, and it's fascinating to go back because you have to go to the library and get a micro-fiche on it. Henry Gadsden said that he wanted, that they can only sell to sick people, that they wanted to be like wriggly gum and sell to everyone. And so when I look at that now, I'm like, oh, wait, you want to keep cradle to grave customers. And so think about it with the antidepressants, telling you that you have a chemical imbalance and you're going to have to be on it for life. And then you don't tell them that they can't get off of them. You've got a perfect storm. And the times where these drugs are most dangerous are going on, off, or dosages changing.

We find people that can't get off of these medicines. The thing is that's happening is people try to get off their antidepressant and then they say, well, my depression starts to come back. Yeah. And what's really happening? Their bodies are addicted to them, right? They can't get off of And so that's really the chemical imbalance that I think gets created is from the antidepressants. We've seen layered drugs. So you might want to, like if you look at the new drugs around the market, the Abilifies that are like, are you still depressed? You've been on them for years. You might need to add abilify.

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I call it the spider web. So our academic institutions, I remember I was shocked that doctors don't learn how the FDA works. What are all the influences of pharmaceutical companies? If they control our medical institutions, then our doctors don't know what they don't No, they control that. They control the FDA, the regulatory agencies. So in 1992, there was a law because there was a lot of pressure for the FDA being too slow during the AIDS crisis of not approving drugs fast enough. And so there was a law passed by Congress, the Prescription Drug User Fee Act, which basically allowed the FDA to collect fees from the drug companies to approve the medications

and get their app with every application, new drug application. And so now that's why we're seeing, you know, 50, 60% of the FDA's budget coming from the industry that they're supposed to be regulating. You're looking at the medical journals. You know, who's behind the medical journals? People are behind the medical journals? Absolutely. It's the selection bias that medical journals are big business because they can do reprints of

articles that then the pharmaceutical companies can go use. use and go talk to the doctors. And then it's the mental health organizations, right? Tell us about the mental health organizations. What's going on with them? Like the National Alliance for Mentally Ill. It might even be some of the school-based mental health clinics. They've all bought into the system of drugs are the solution.

Wait. This campaign of the last 10 or so years that's everywhere, it's on social media, every single kid, mental health, mental health, de-sting, mental health. This is all we hear now. This was funded by pharma. Yep. My late husband used to tell me, if you want to get to the bottom, if anything, Kim, follow the money. Like a lot of these patient advocacy organizations that you think are advocating for the disease, right, like American Cancer Society or national mental health, NAMI, go look at who's funding it. It's pharmaceutical companies. And guess what? They become an extension of the marketing department. So they're out there

at all these meetings and all pushing agendas to get more drugs on the market. The Make It Okay campaign, in theory, it sounds like a good thing. Like, we should talk about mental health. But now we've become over like to the point, like everybody's got a mental health. Like when I heard the dating apps, now people put on like, I've got a mental, I'm like, to me, that is like run. Run. Well, of course. De-stating. mental health when that wording became, you know, part of the cultural zeitgeist, when you heard that, I think initially we just assumed, oh, talk about your feelings. It's okay to not bottle up your feelings inside. The reality was it wasn't about don't bottle up your feelings.

It was take this bottle of antidepressants. Exactly. It became normalized to just say, oh, because we're destigmatizing mental health and we need to be prescribing more antidepressants and then nobody can judge you for that or question that because then you are stigmatizing mental health. It's honestly freaking brilliant. It is brilliant. It's brilliant. Like I've seen it so many times with campaigns on different drugs. Like they'll use veteran groups. They'll use kid groups. They'll use like, it was like another drug and they got the made it out to be the FDA is, it was for like a female Vigra, basically, and saying, oh, the FDA is sexist because they're not approving it. So they got all the women congressional members, senators to write to the FDA to put pressure. I'm like, oh, my God,

it's brilliantly evil, but brilliant. Like, so if you're a marketer and I say they're big business, it's big business, it's marketing. These are all really great strategies. What are we seeing in regards to a violence connection to antidepressants? Remember that 1991 hearing was on the emergence of violence and suicide. Emergence of violence and suicide. But the suicide, we got done, right? We were able to do studies. They still, like when you look at the, when they started looking at school shooters

and looking at the medications that they were on, they're on some kind of psychiatric drug. Now, again, correlation, causation, two different things, but we have not studied it. And every time that there is a mass shooting, what do they do? They close down the records. When I look back to when that corner asked me, was Woody on any medication, that was a lightball? You know, I'm thinking naively whenever there's a school shooting, we should have all their records. We should know all of it. Oh, no, no, no.

It gets shut down. It's gotten worse. Like back in the day, they might have reported it in the media. Now you can't get that information of the school. Then I want to say one of the documents, Pfizer's known about it. Pfizer helped create a prosecutor manual in 1993. That was to be used to help when somebody did something and when they said the drug, that Pfizer helped create this manual to help use to argue against their drug. They've thought of everything.

They've thought about everything. And there's other documents that, again, that's why I love my binder of documents. Pfizer says, I don't think Fluxitine, which was Prozac, is out of the woods yet with its association with violence. So these guys have known about it. All I'm asking for for the public is we are all sitting ducks when we go to a movie theater. We go somewhere. We have no idea. Like, why wouldn't we want to investigate? We should be demanding an investigation or like have the tools open that the who are the, the, you know, the police, the FBI on any of these major, that we can get to the bottom, were they on any medications? We should want to know. Let's talk about the, I think, medieval torture, basically being perpetrated by antidepressants when it comes to sexual dysfunction. This is something that, in my view, is so buried. Almost nobody even knows about it. And yet almost every

teenage girl is on Lexapro. So can you talk to us about what are we seeing happen to young people who take Lexapro or an antidepressant for as little as just a couple weeks when it comes to sexual dysfunction and desire for the rest of their life? I think if you as a person that was going to consider going on this drug was told that it could have the ability to impact your sex life for the rest of your life, you would probably think twice about it, right? But when you don't have that information and the companies have kept it from you. The FDA has not warned about it when other companies or other countries have. We have a problem like public citizen, one of the organizations that has helped to push the FDA and really has done an amazing job in this area,

filed a lawsuit against the FDA to find out why don't we have warnings on the sexual dysfunction. And so some people can get it as quick as almost immediately. Others, it might be when they come off the drugs and then they still have nothing because it's a numbing agent. People are experiencing complete genital numbness, inability to reach climax, right? Yep. Am I correct in that? Yes. And also numbness in just your emotional connection and ability to have a relationship. So all of this has been known.

And it happens in some cases almost immediately for the rest of your life. life. The rest of your life. People are completely dysfunctional some of these people. Yep. First of all, if you don't know about it, you don't know what even ask. But then even if you know about it, you're like, it's not going to probably happen to me until it does, right? And so you don't know, like I always say it's like Russian roulette. You have no idea what, could this drug do what happened to Woody? Could it be that you can't have sex? It's part of, like part of our lives. Like as you get older and it's the connection, the emotional connection, what if, but you don't know until you take it. And we're giving it to kids as young as seven. We're giving these drugs out like candy. And we have to really take a step back. And these are like little brains that are forming that we're giving medications to seven year olds. Like with all of those drugs. What do you know about the marketing in regards to Lexipro? Why is why does it seem to be this is the most popular anti-depripping? present with teenagers. They must be doing something. Well, I look at it and go, I think about the influencers

that are out there on like TikTok, everybody, they're kind of making it into like Alexa Ho. I mean, which is not anything you should be proud of in my mind. But there is marketing. You remember, drug companies are using all of the most sophisticated marketing tools, getting nano influencers, the micro influencers, they know who they are that might in their little social networks, that they can talk about it, they get people, they get the talking about it, it becomes like the cool thing to do. This is the stuff we need to stop. And you really, like as parents, I would be questioning all of this,

healthy dose of skepticism. For people who lost everything in the LA fires, are you concerned about a rise in antidepressant prescriptions? I'm very concerned because whenever there's trauma or grief and there's great grief right now out there. The idea of a quick fix, a pill, you're sad, you should be sad. You lost everything. It is traumatic when you watch, even if it didn't happen to you, you live in a community where it's been devastated, right? And that idea that you can pill away a grief.

and I'm very concerned and I think it's the thing where people need to take a pause and I will never forget shortly after Woody died I went to the doctor and my doctor said do you think you need anything right and I looked at her and I'm like

well I think it's what killed my husband and then I said but aren't I supposed to hurt my husband died and she literally said but you don't need to Grief is a normal, like, human response. And I feel like we have walked away from what does it mean to be normal?

What does it mean to have trauma? What does it mean to have struggle? Like, a pill's not going to take this away. You still have to go through it. And so, anyways, I'm very concerned about the pill, the rise of pills that will be used and thrown at people, you know, because they're sad. As somebody who has testified before the FDA, what do you think the agency gets right? I know there may not be very much.

And where do they fall short when it comes to protecting patients from harmful side effects? Kind of a trick question, because I think I can see more doing where we have done a lot of things wrong. Like, I think there's this impression that the FDA is looking out for you and I. They're not. I now sit as a member of the psychopharmillogic drugs advisory committee, the same one that in 91 didn't do their job. I'm now the consumer rep on that committee. And so I've seen things very differently where harms are not really talked about.

So I would love to see, you got to remember, the same people that approve the drugs are the same ones that are responsible for any harms. and a lot of drugs are coming onto the market faster with less data. And so I think we need to get rid of the user fees, you know, the drug companies paying the FDA. We need to separate out the people who are approving and post-market. We need to actually follow up when there's harm. Everything's breakthrough.

The FDA is even, if you start really following what they're doing, they're becoming, in some ways, an extension of the drug companies marketing departments too, sent and issuing press releases. No, we don't need the FDA to be sending out press releases on a good drug, right? Do you think you could think of anything good the FDA does? I think there are some really, really good people that are in the middle management that really went into the FDA to be public health servants. For them, I have worked with some of them. And I know they're trying, but it's so political at the top. And the system in which they, you know, have to work in makes it very difficult.

But there are good people at the FDA. My boyfriend is one of those I don't care what I use. It's fine kind of guys. But me, of course, I'm on a mission to swap all his personal care products for cleaner non-toxic options. The first victory, I did successfully transition him to zebra toothpaste. No weird chemicals. no parabins, no fluoride, just the good stuff. And not only did it work, but he actually really liked it. So huge win. Next step is going to be zebra deodorant. This stuff smells amazing. It goes on clear,

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You know, some of these are not money makers. So faith. Belonging to some sort of community. Yeah, community, faith, exercise, what are foods? Also, maybe just having somebody to talk to and maybe some initial talk therapy, although that can last forever if you don't, You know, that's a business too.

Yep. Shorten the therapy. Yeah, short therapy. I think, you know, this idea that maybe we need to really think about not calling it mental health and think about it as mental well-being and what are the things that we can do, and including changing the conversation around struggles are real, that we're not supposed to live a perfect, like life is not supposed to always be happy. Like some of the greatest things are when you struggle and you come through it on the other side.

There's a confidence that comes out of you and you build skills that you never knew that you had. So those are all things that I think have to be a part of a system that we look at mental health differently. Where are the best places somebody can go to find help on getting off of their antidepressant? Inner Compass. Laura Delano has an organization that has helped people get off of these medications. She's a survivor. And I think the best part of it is talking to fellow survivors or people who have already been on and have been successfully able to get off. There is a woman, Angela Peacock. There's the modley prescription, our deprescribing guidelines out of the UK, Mark Horowitz, that has done some amazing work.

And I think really talking to other people, and that's why we need social media. Like, this is one of the good things that can come out of social media, although we saw some horrible things with the vaccine injured. But communities asking others how to get off and what things that they had done. Because, you know, when you go to your doctors, they should tell you.

and if somebody's going to get put on one of these medications, I would always ask, well, what's my exit strategy? So you have a conversation. What is my exit strategy? What is my exit strategy? I've heard so many stories. I've been on it for 30 years. I can never get off these.

I'm like, well, have you tried? And if you have, like, there's just, we've bought into this. What different mental health practices have worked for you that don't involve medication? I think right from the beginning, I found purpose. I love somatic body work because if you think, if you believe that we are physical, mental and spiritual beings, which we do on this show. We are, like, we have to look at, we're holistic, right? And we have done everything like in one, like almost silo, like physical. But if physical, like a lot of the anxiety, depression is almost in some ways is spiritual. So, you know, and knowing that it gets. trapped in your body. So I'm a big person on like moving, exercising, dancing, has worked for me,

doing something that scares me. If you were to look back at who I was as a little kid, I was not the one that ever stirred the pot. I was not the one sitting. I was the good girl and never questioned. But when I got and went to the FDA because now I've paid the ultimate price, there was something about doing it anyways, the fear. And so like that was something that was really helpful for me. Friends, community. And also knowing, guess what? It's going to be, it's going to kind of

suck for a while. Right. Being okay with being uncomfortable temporarily. Yeah. Yeah. Also realizing that a lot of the stories are just stories in your head, right? They're just thoughts. They're, you know, like meditation. You know, you start looking. They're like clouds floating by. If you could re, again, it's all about refurb.

framing mental well-being. Where do you see the future of mental health care, particularly regarding pharmaceutical treatments? What changes do you hope to see this current administration focus on when it comes to improving public health? Well, I actually, for the first time, I will say the current, the new administration has the potential because I think we've seen the things, there's a lot of lights that have been shined on what's wrong. I think there are, for the time I feel optimistic that they're going to be the right people in key positions. But we've got Dr. Marty McCarrie for FDA. What do you think? Oh, I've worked with him over the years. I think he's great. I love Dr. Marty. We testified at the Senate together on chronic

disease, so I got to know him and he's incredible. You know what I like about him? He understands the issues. He's also worked in the system. He knows that we need drugs too, right? There are diseases that we're going to need it. But he also knows the problems. You and I, the everyday person, who's taking the medications, he understands the system. So I think, and he's also willing to work with people. So I'm excited about, I think he's going to be great. What are the top changes you'd like to see made in terms of pharmacology in America? Sorry, my industry. I'd like to get drug ads off the air. We've tried. I mean, I think that's, there's no need for them. I think that's going to be one of the first initiatives of the Trump administration. I think, I think so. I think it's going to, you know,

we tried it before, but I think that one, I think there's a, deep desire to make that change. So I think drugs off the air, I think more attention to talking about harms and stories and connecting the dots. And I think there are some major things that have to happen, which is you got to be able to, if you get harmed by a manufacturer, you need to be able to sue them. If they have no liability, of course it's just going to keep growing. So I think that is one thing. I think this idea of, of informed consent and really putting out this, that we need to have a focus on information.

We need to empower individuals and give them information and get marketing out of healthcare. I mean, that would be a real goal of mine. How can people join you in this activism? What can we do like you are to change laws? You should be telling your story. Because I think when we collectively tell stories, there's momentum that is going to push.

Contacting your representatives, also dig deeper. I say stay away from mainstream media. They're saying somebody's really bad. 19,000 doctors are against it, really? Go and dig deeper. So I would encourage people to do that. Follow the people, like, come follow me on Twitter. I would love to have more people.

I'd love to get to a point where we have less of this censorship on social media to talk about things like drug side effects and harm. from medical products because that is true freedom. I mean, that seems like such a human rights violation to me is withholding that information or censoring that information from people. I mean, right now you have, you know, Facebook is allegedly saying that they're going to commit to free speech in the way that X has. I hope that YouTube follows suit. If you're listening or watching on YouTube right now, then you know every single time that we've said the word suicide, we've had to beep it.

So there's a reason for that is because of all, you know, these rules and all these different things and even, I don't even know, there might be other stuff that we have to beep in this YouTube version, which is just insanity. But as always, you can watch the entire full, uncensored version of the show on Spotify. But I think that's helpful. I think there's a lot of people that have stories like you. And maybe even hearing Kim's story today, you're like, oh my gosh, I didn't even put two and two together. My loved one was also prescribed and antidepressant. and then, you know, passed away shortly after. Do you hear stories like that all the time of people just now realizing it could be decades later that that's what happened?

I get contacted all the time from people who, like, their dad died. I mean, we're talking decades. And they are starting to hear these because we're talking about it. So it actually drives me crazy when I hear that YouTube blurbs out, like bleeps out suicide. Because why are we, like if we're make it okay, talk about, stigma. Like, we should be talking about this too. Right. I mean, this word is something that we should be talking about, but it's too close to the drugs that might be causing it. Nobody wants to talk about that. But I do think we need to have the ability to have free conversation. So I think back,

when I started going out to D.C., you had to get on a plane and you had to show up. And your voice is powerful. And so I'm always telling people, if you can, go out and do that. But we didn't have social media. And if we did, I'm not sure we would, how far we would have gotten with telling this story. Yeah. And I say share, you know, share these episodes. Go back and look at those 91 hearings. Go look at the 2004. Go look at the 2006. It's the same story. The the hairstyles have changed. clothing has changed. It's the same story. And I think it's really important that you are keeping like these kind of issues alive. Because remember when they had the hearings in 91, I was like in college. It wasn't even on my radar. And so when we came into it in 2004 and 2006, it was a big deal.

Like these FDA hearings, they had security guards and families were like, you killed our kid. And then you had the other side saying, these drugs saved my life. And you're like, oh my God, can we have both and? You know, it's not a black or white. It's a gray. It's we need information. That's all we're asking. But now you look at all the parents and people that are in their 20s, 30s now.

Nobody knows. They just have been so desensitized to like every drug has side effects of like, and it may cause suicide. Like nobody thinks it's going to happen to them. So I think keeping these conversations alive. and being not afraid to push back on your doctors and also start thinking about this idea of like, life's not meant to be all rainbows and unicorns and happy and life is all of it. And that's what makes it life.

A full life is every emotion. Yeah, it's all of it. What do you think your husband would think about all the work that you've done? I think you'd be really proud. because I was not the person who would ever stir the pot and I will never forget he would take on like they were putting these two cell phone towers in our neighborhood and and Woody was like Kim let's go get you know people to sign the petitions you know so and bring it to city council and I looked at him I'm like no Woody you're never going to make a difference and he goes

I'd rather try like hell and lose than do nothing at all. And I think he would be like, girl, like you actually now understand what I was talking about. And I almost feel like in some ways when he died, like as he was past in his spirit, like past the baton to me. If you could offer one remedy to heal us at culture and that could be physically, mentally or spiritually, what would it be? Oh, trust your body. your body is so wise like there's an intuition when it when something feels and you feel it trust it not here here like it doesn't lie so i think that is one and and move and realize that god like that would be such a big deal that if we could listen and trust who we are, that we came into this world as creative,

every one of us as creative beings. We all have light inside us. And life happens. And we spend our whole life trying to get back to where we came into the world, that we are perfectly whole and healthy the way we came into this world. And so that's what I would hope is to remember the light that came in this body, the spirit that's in here. Where can people follow you on social media? You mention your Twitter. Are you also on Instagram? Yeah, I'm on Instagram.

Kim Wittzak. How do you spell your last name? W-I-T-C-Z-A-K. And I always say Twitter, but I guess it's X. At Woody Matters is my Twitter address. And then I also have a sub-stack, acceptable collateral damage. Ooh. And then I put little parentheses and say unacceptable collateral damage because Woody is not considered acceptable collateral damage or the cost to join business. And there are too many Woody's out there and they are somebody's love in their life. Kim, thank you for coming on Culture Apothecary. Oh, thanks for having me. I love this conversation. Share this episode because whether it's a loved one or a friend or a passive follower, it could have. absolutely save a life or connect dots that have never been connected.

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